


To Light a Cigarette in a Rainstorm

by OrionLady



Category: On the Run (Series) - Gordon Korman
Genre: Brother-Sister Relationships, Cancer, Community: smallfandomfest, FBI, Families of Choice, Friendship, Gen, Organ Transplantation, Unconventional Families
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-19
Updated: 2019-09-19
Packaged: 2020-10-21 20:27:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20699375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OrionLady/pseuds/OrionLady
Summary: Aiden Falconer gets that dreaded phone call. But the one at death’s door is the last person he ever expected. He and Meg have hours to save a man they once hated.





	To Light a Cigarette in a Rainstorm

**Author's Note:**

> I know this is a dead fandom and I'm pretty sure this is one of the first stories for it. Please, do yourself a favour and stop reading this to go get your hands on a copy of "On the Run" by Gordon Korman. 
> 
> Title is taken from Erich Maria Remarque’s "All Quiet on the Western Front." Also a great (sad) book.

The crumbling strip mall had more “For Lease” signs than businesses. It sat off the freeway, tucked behind a glitzy car dealership. Only a spattering of vehicles sat in the row of parking spaces. If someone were to pass by the wall height windows of the strip mall—an unlikely event—he or she would see the side profile of a man in his early thirties.

He hunched in front of a laptop. For in this building were private office rooms too. 

It would be a lie to say he was typing: 

Brow furrowed. Scowling at the blank page. Cursor blinking. 

“Dang it all,” said the man, dragging a hand through his chestnut hair. “Why can’t I get my hero out of this scrape?”

He jumped halfway out of his seat when his cellphone’s ringing answered. Seconds of frantic searching paid off when, on the last ring, he found it suffocating under a mound of case files in the desk drawer. 

“Falconer here. I don’t have my report done up yet if you’re wonderi—”

The man listened to a solemn voice on the other end. His lids floated down to half-mast. The lines around his forehead smoothed. With a long sigh, he switched the laptop off. The screen went dark.

“No,” he said. “I’ll tell my sister. How much time does Harris have?”

A long pause followed, then a tinny voice. 

Aiden Falconer’s face lost all colour.

* * *

Half a state over, an athletic brunette clapped her hands. She helped a wheezing teenager off the ground. 

“That was the third fall this week, Maddie. Count the horse’s canter beats between jumps!”

Maddie remounted the horse and trotted close past her coach.

The woman was so focused on her struggling show jumping student, boots caked with mud, that she didn’t notice an older student duck under the outdoor arena fence. 

“Coach Falconer—”

“Maddie! That’s five beats not three! You’re not giving your horse enough time.”

“Coach Fal—”

“And extend those arms! Elbows in!”

The student held out the stable’s cordless phone. “Coach Falconer, there’s a call for you from your brother.”

Magic words. The eternally magic words. Meg Falconer grabbed the phone with breathless thanks. She turned all her attention to it at once. The older student flashed a sympathetic smile and took over Maddie’s lesson.

Meg left the arena and had to lean on a horse trailer parked in front of her office. “Aiden?”

“_Meg, thank God. How’s the equestrian business?_”

Meg grinned. This was the same phone conversation opener, every time. She ached to hug him. She fired back the usual retort— “How’s the latest novel coming along?”

Aiden sighed. “_Stuck. At least consulting work for the FBI has kept me busy…_”

His voice cracked and Meg straightened with a sharp breath. “Aiden, what is it? Why are you calling in the middle of the day? We weren’t supposed to Skype until this weekend.”

“_I know. But I just got a call from Sorenson._”

“Harris?” Meg asked. Her eyes grew wide. Cheeks pale. Her thoughts turned to the tall FBI agent.

“_He kept this from me!_” All at once Aiden exploded. It wasn’t a stretch to imagine his tight pacing around the office. “_I’ve been working with Harris for years and he never even thought to tell me that…that…_”

Meg closed her eyes.

She carefully cleared her throat. “I’ll be on the next flight to Washington.”

* * *

The flight was long and uncomfortable, especially in the middle of an August thunderstorm. Others cried and gasped at the turbulence. Meg just stared blankly ahead; she’d lived through assassins, shipwreck, and car chases. A storm was small potatoes. She thought of the talk Harris had given Aiden and Meg after her kidnapping about adrenaline poisoning. 

Her eyes misted.

Aiden’s flight was delayed when Meg arrived so she had breakfast at a tiny airport café. This area was sleepy, quiet vendors watching CNN news on corner monitors and calling loved ones. 

When the next flight number was announced, Meg shot out of her chair. A backpack thumped on her back, the only luggage she’d brought.

Passengers began to fill the terminal and wait at the belt for their suitcases. Aiden didn’t. He flew down the terminal. Meg matched him stride for stride. They ran into each other’s arms, never mind that they’d just seen each other at Mom and Dad’s Fourth of July party. The embrace lasted long enough to draw curious eyes. 

At last Meg stepped back. Her eyes were wet.

Aiden hadn’t brought _any_ luggage. 

He followed her surprised gaze and chuckled. “Didn’t have time to pack a bag. Or…I didn’t really care, to be honest.”

“How spontaneous of you, bro.”

Aiden filled her in on the details during their cab ride to the hospital. They hadn’t even bothered to go to a motel first. Every minute counted. When Aiden sat back, his face was tired.

Meg whistled. “Wow. Six months he’s been doing chemo on the sly.”

“He never even told Sorenson,” said Aiden. “He and their boss found out pretty much when I did. Harris collapsed on a case and had to spill. He’s been admitted to ICU.”

The car became a vacuum. It felt like work just to pull air in. 

“And get this,” said Aiden. “_We_ were listed as his next of kin. That’s why Sorenson had to call us first.”

Learning that the president secretly took tap dancing wouldn’t have shocked Meg as much as this statement did. She gaped at her brother. 

Still…

“I mean, he doesn’t have a wife or kids,” Meg reasoned. “Maybe he just put us down as a peace offering, out of remorse. Or, like, a ‘they’ll never know anyway’ gesture.”

Aiden raised a brow. “I guess we’ll find out.”

* * *

Even after fifteen years since their fugitive days, hospitals still made the Falconers nervous. Aiden wondered if these kinds of side effects would ever go away. A nurse directed them up a flight of stairs and into the cancer care section of the ward. The quiet must have bothered Meg too because she took Aiden’s hand.

Room 315. There it was.

“No more of those pebbly peas!” groused a deep voice over the sound of a dialysis machine. “If that’s what you’re here for, move along!”

Aiden thought abruptly of the time Emmanuel Harris lunged between Aiden and a mother bear. His six foot seven frame had stood like a monument to the Falconer family. 

Harris didn’t look so imposing now. Aiden couldn’t juxtapose the two images, that they were the same man. This Harris was wan and haggard in his extra-long hospital bed. His feet still hung off the end. 

Meg made a choked noise. “Oh!”

She leaned down and hugged him around the neck. 

Harris looked just as surprised to see them. He absently patted Meg’s back. 

“Sorenson called,” said Aiden, stepping closer and shaking the agent’s hand.

“I suppose he had to,” Harris admitted. “It’s not as bad as it looks. Just had too many of these stone age vegetables.”

“Or too much coffee,” quipped Meg.

The attempt at humour died after a moment. Harris regarded the siblings with an unblinking gaze, an expression Aiden had never seen before. Searching, apprising.

“You’ve become a dear friend,” said Aiden frankly.

“Yeah.” Meg set a hand on her hip. Both men smiled. “After all the high flying stunts and scrapes with criminals, I just never thought you…this can’t be how it ends. You’ve had lots of time to think. For us, it’s happening so fast.”

Aiden pulled up a chair and sank down into it. His legs refused to support him any longer. He shot Harris a sharp look of his own.

“You kept this from me."

Harris shook his head. “It was a selfish thing. I didn’t want you to think of me as weak. Your parents even invited me to Thanksgiving and now I won’t be able to make it—”

“Weak?” Meg flushed a brilliant shade of crimson. “_Weak_? You are one of the strongest people I know! And selfless. Just. Caring. How dare you sell yourself short! Plus, you once ripped a radiator off a hospital wall with your bare hands, which is always butch.”

This was apparently too much for Harris. Seeing the kids, plus this memory and all that it meant, did him in. He began to laugh, throaty, robust chuckles that pealed through the room and left him breathless. Fresh spots of colour blossomed in his pallid face.

Aiden had to join in the infectious sound. Meg shook her head at them with an exasperated grin. Her eyes crinkled.

“My kidneys have about a week left in ‘em, doc tells me,” said Harris around the last of his chuckles. “Can’t think of two better people to spend it with.

Aiden and Meg sobered.

“Is there anyone we can call for you?” asked Meg.

Harris huffed. “Sorenson wasn’t even supposed to call you. Traitor.”

They fell silent and something gripped them, something Aiden didn’t have a name for. It was, he suddenly realized, the same something that had driven both Falconers onto a flight without even calling to fill their parents in. That made Harris put their names down instead of John and Louise.

The idea of losing Harris now was beyond terrifying. It was unthinkable.

_He’s the only one who gets it_, thought Aiden. Meg gripped his hand from where she perched on the edge of the bed. 

For all that their parents blessed them with a sense of normalcy after their unbelievable year, something they had desperately needed to relearn, when the nightmares, panic attacks, and those insistent fears crept in—Meg and Aiden had been just as alone as the day they ran from Sunnydale.

And then Harris had bounded in, hated and then the fiercest ally they’d ever known. Probably would ever know. Without him…Aiden and Meg, though they would never say it out loud, still felt a little lost. Detached from the real world.

Night fell. Harris had long since drifted off but the Falconer siblings stared in a trance-like, growing horror. They didn’t speak for hours. Nurses rotated shifts and supper trays were cleared. 

“This is happening,” Meg whispered. 

Aiden shrugged. His fingers ached but he refused to let go of her hand. “He’s in his late fifties. We always knew that Harris might…even the line of duty…”

But they didn’t know. That was the problem.

“Not like this,” Meg insisted. “He deserves better.”

Aiden’s mind wandered to a future conversation where he informed his parents Harris wouldn’t be joining them for Thanksgiving and Christmas after all. His stomach dropped. It had taken years for his parents to consider Harris a friend, as their children did.

_We’ve got to stay positive when Harris wakes up_, Aiden ordered himself. _We’re better together, otherwise Harris wouldn’t have listed us as his own flesh and…flesh and…_

Inspiration came in such a flash that Aiden fell out of his chair. 

Meg went down with him. She jerked their twined hands. Miraculously, Harris slept on.

“What was that?” Meg hissed. She eyed her brother’s open, slack face. “What?”

_Should I tell her? _

Meg’s stormy brow cleared. She read Aiden in a heartbeat. “Bro, that’s it.”

“It might not work.” Aiden rushed to temper the hope flaring in his sister’s eyes. “Lots of times it doesn’t and the patient dies. But if it did work….”

“He’d never let us try it anyway.”

“That’s why he isn’t going to know until it’s over,” said Aiden.

* * *

The surgeon narrowed his eyes at Aiden and Meg, but his incredulity was obvious. If he hadn’t been sitting down already he would’ve needed to. His pen hovered over a long form. Aiden and Meg had already signed their consent at the bottom. 

“You…want to do this…anonymously?” the surgeon parroted.

Meg nodded. “That’s our only condition. Harris can’t wait any longer.”

“We’re a match, right?” said Aiden. “So what does it matter if Harris knows who the donors are?”

The surgeon blustered over a stack of papers on his desk. Brother and sister waited patiently, hands folded in their laps, until the man regained his composure.

“I…I don’t know if this is strictly procedure….”

Meg grit her teeth. She was alive and in this office today because she had thrown procedure out the window. Being hunted for almost ten thousand miles by federal task forces did that to a person.

“Lots of people receive new organs and die never knowing who gave them,” said Aiden. “What’s the difference?”

“But you’re next of kin,” the doctor argued.

Meg leaned forward and placed both hands on the desk. “Which is exactly why we have to do this. What are the chances that all three of us are compatible matches? Especially considering Harris is a huge black guy?”

“Meg,” Aiden snorted. “Compatibility of kidneys has nothing to do with ethnicity or size—”

“And what about exploring all our options, huh?” Meg was on her feet now in a horse-trainer’s stance. 

Aiden rolled his eyes at the interruption.

The surgeon nodded, slow and pale. “In thirty years of medicine, I’ve never seen a case—a kinship—like yours. It’s amazing.”

The Falconers beamed.

* * *

Harris woke only long enough to play a few rounds of chess and gush about the news.

“A compatible donor—imagine that!” He was so excited he didn’t even notice Aiden put him in check. “They did it so fast. But at least now the prognosis isn’t terminal, provided my body accepts the new kidneys.”

Aiden and Meg exchanged a glance. 

When Harris fell asleep over the board, Aiden and Meg patted his hand, prayed this worked, and spent the night being prepped for urgent surgery. They refused the offer to be separated. Both went under the anesthetic, shivering in their Johnny shirts, still holding hands.

Meg woke to the smell of antiseptic and her brother’s shampoo. The room throbbed with a fuzzy sort of beat. 

_That’s my heartbeat_, thought Meg. She frowned. _It’s awfully slow._

“Honey.” A Latino nurse bent over Meg’s line of vision. Her ringlets bobbed. “You’re going to feel cold for a few hours until the anesthetic wears off. Here, let’s get you into a nice fleecy housecoat.” 

The nurse helped Meg out of the bed and into a side bathroom. Passing the bed not an arm’s distance from hers, she saw Aiden still out cold. 

“It worked,” Meg whispered while she washed her hands. Lifting up her shirt, she spied a pink smear and fifteen stitches smiling across her right side. 

Meg, pale, smirked into the mirror. Success never tasted so sweet.

“Miss Falconer? Need any assistance?”

“Coming!”

Meg trundled out to the sight of her brother scarfing down a cup of jello.

“Whoa, bro,” said Meg. “I bet if you ask nicely they’ll outfit you with a drip.”

Aiden just grinned back. His eyes shone, a tad bright, with the same thrill of victory Meg was feeling. They hugged like they hadn’t seen each other for years instead of a few hours. 

“Alright, Miss…Miss Falconer!”

The nurse finally wrestled Meg back into her bed. She and Aiden chattered to each other while they ate. 

Several minutes later, the surgeon emerged, eyes tired but turned up at the edges. He’d changed into fresh green scrubs. 

“It worked,” he said around a relived sigh. “We’re taking Harris into surgery now. We’ll remove his shut down kidneys and replace them with yours. One of each. Never heard anything like it in all my life.”

He continued to debrief Aiden and Meg while two nurses steered them in wheelchairs for the room where the siblings would spend the day ‘for observation.’ 

“Really,” said Meg, shifting uncomfortably. “We’re fine. We can walk.”

“The wheelchairs are just procedure,” said the surgeon where he walked between the pair. “And you be sure to read those print outs I gave you on how to take care of your bodies in this new situation, okay?”

“Of course, doctor,” said Aiden. “Just let us know how it goes with Harris.”

Meg felt amazing. There was no reason to think she and Aiden, in peak health, would suffer the loss of one kidney each. Their wheeling around twists and turns felt like a victory lap. 

For once, they had done it. They had saved Harris. They hadn’t let him down after all. 

Their convoy had almost made it to the hospital room, morning light streaming through the windows, when it happened. The sight made Meg’s heart race in a way it hadn’t since she was eleven years old—

A dark figure, being wheeled in his bed, appeared around the corner. There was no time to abort, even though the surgeon tried to. 

Harris passed close by Aiden’s elbow and his eyes went huge. He took in Meg and Aiden’s thin pallor, hospital bracelets, Johnny gowns, and the surgeon standing next to them in one smooth sweep of his razor sharp FBI brain.

“_Freeze_!” Harris roared.

And, wonder of wonders, Aiden and Meg reached down as one mind and locked the tires of their wheelchairs. It was the first time Meg had ever obeyed a direct order from J. Edgar Giraffe. Her head spun.

Even three nurses couldn’t keep Harris down. He rose to his elbows. His face contorted in a host of furious pretzel twists. He kept hollering but nobody could tell what he was saying.

Aiden tried to calm him. Harris roared on. Nurses scurried around monitors and yelled to each other about blood pressure. 

Meg suddenly realized Harris was crying. Crying. 

Emmanuel Harris, best FBI agent in half a century, broke down weeping. 

It was such an astounding, novel thing that everyone on the scene just…stopped.

Fat tears squeezed out of the shocked eyes and snaked down the weathered cheeks. Harris’ face scrunched and he hid it in his hand. Aiden sucked in a sharp breath. Meg, unblinking, rose slowly from her chair. 

She crossed the space between them in one long stride. Her fingers tugged Harris’ hand away from his eyes. 

“Why?” the agent croaked. “You’re young—you have your whole lives. Lives _I_ ruined! Why would you do this?”

Meg shifted back to look at Aiden. A volume of words passed between them, that certain something that united them in a way other siblings never understood. 

Meg faced front again. She patted Harris’ cheek. “Because you're family. You’re _ours_. You'll always be a part of the story that made us who we are.”

Harris let out a huge sob. 

Aiden stood next to his sister and held out a handkerchief. “We forgave you a long time ago, Harris. I think it’s high time you forgave yourself.”

Harris did something even more shocking than his crying. 

He leaned out and with one huge arm looped Aiden and Meg to his chest. The siblings went limp as if struck by lightning. Harris pecked Aiden and Meg on their foreheads and wept some more into their shoulders. 

“Nope,” said the surgeon, gaping along with the rest. “I take it back. _That _is the most amazing thing I’ve seen in thirty years of medicine.”

* * *

Snow came early for November. Frosty tickles settled across blades of grass recently mowed. Geese flew overhead in a lazy V formation.

The last guest, however, came late. 

The Falconers believed in close friends now instead of many acquaintances. Aiden was helping his new girlfriend make the family rounds. Louise was thrilled beyond imagining. Meg grilled this new woman to see if she would treat her brother well. Their father retreated to the kitchen to finish basting the turkey. 

Aiden almost didn’t notice their last guest slip in quietly through the back door, removing his coat and size fifteen loafers. Aiden excused himself. 

“You came,” said Aiden. 

Harris had a loose curl to his mouth. He looked calmer, more at ease than Aiden ever remembered. The cable knit sweater and lack of gun might have helped. Retirement suited the man.

“Couldn’t refuse John Falconer’s famous garlic turkey.”

Aiden winked. “Wait ‘til you try mom’s cheesecake.”

Harris eyed the crowd in the next room. His eyes alighted on Aiden with a quirked brow.

“What?” asked Aiden, defensive.

“You going to ask that pretty girl to marry you? Hear you’ve been secretly dating her for a while now.”

Aiden rolled his eyes. “What is with everyone nosing into my personal life? And Meg knew. Couldn’t keep anything from her if I tried.”

“Well?”

“I meant to ask you about that, actually.” Aiden set down his punch and shifted. “I’m going to need a best man…”

Harris startled, like Aiden had slapped him. “What? And you decided I was a good choice for that?”

“Shut up. You know you want to say yes.”

Harris smiled again and Aiden smiled too. Aiden tugged the man in for a quick hug. 

“I’m going soft,” Harris said and didn’t look one ounce remorseful about it. “But of course I will be your best man. I’d be honoured.”

“I had to tell my parents about the operation,” said Aiden, stepping back. “They would’ve found out eventually.”

Before Harris could reply, Louise spotted him and shrieked her delight.

“Emmanuel! Get in here! It’s so lovely you could make it!”

Meg hugged him first and then their mother. 

“Aiden told me about your battle with cancer,” said John. “I’m so glad you’re feeling better.”

“My body accepted the transplant. And I have your kids to thank.” Harris’ throat worked. “I don’t think I can ever repay that debt.”

Meg scoffed. “Don’t be stupid. You owe us nothing but wearing an ugly Christmas sweater at Mom’s Christmas Eve party. Wear a reindeer costume and we’ll call it even.”

“But now you really are family!” exclaimed Mom. “Our own blood.”

Aiden had the immense satisfaction of seeing Harris blush. Deeply.

The day was filled with too much food and an excess of laughter. Harris kept quiet but he looked bewildered to have so many people who cared about whether he ate enough or if he was participating in conversation.

“Get used to it,” said Aiden softly, when plates were being cleared.

There was a lazy moment when just the three of them were alone at the table. Aiden remembered agonizing nights on the run, working towards this very sense of home. He looked at his sister’s distant eyes and knew she felt the same contentment, the same memories.

Harris caught their eyes. And something burned between them. Something private and scalding.

“You stubborn people are the best thing that’s ever happened to me.” Harris held up his glass. “To family.”

Aiden and Meg clinked their glasses to his. 

“To family.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written November 2016.


End file.
